Behind the Façades in France: What expats and the mainstream media (French and American alike) fail to notice (or fail to tell you) about French attitudes, principles, values, and official positions…

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Sarkozy Wife Prides Herself in Feeling Like a Little Girl When Meeting Obama

One of the publishing events of the season in France is an autobiography by Cécilia AttiasNicolas Sarkozy is back in the news, having successfully fought off at a time when "investigation into charges that [the former President] had
manipulated a fragile heiress into financing his 2007 campaign, removing
a potential obstacle to the political return that Mr. Sarkozy is widely
assumed to be planning."

The wife (his second) who divorced Sarko (her second husband) shortly after he was elected president in 2007 wanted to tell her own truth and has been going around giving interviews.

Among other things in the Elle interview, the former Cécilia Ciganer-Albéniz ex-Martin ex-Sarkozy has something quite good to say and something rather appalling to say.

For instance, she writes that in New York, where she now lives, they would speak of someone like her father (a Jewish immigrant who had to rebuild everything in France) as "a self-made man."

I regret that in France, such a person is called an upstart [a parvenu].

But later, when asked to explain why Nicolas lost in 2012, she suggests that it might be too much transparency, which is

a
double-edged sword. By showing oneself too close [to the people], one
risks to lose the grandeur of the post. For instance, I don't like the
idea of a "normal president" [as François Hollande styles himself].
When I meet a president, i like to be intimidated. I may be naive but I
claim the right of being impressed. I need to admire. When I met Barack
Obama, I became a little girl!

Perhaps women should become like little girls when meeting people like Obama, Cécilia, but should grown men feel like small boys?!

No man — indeed, no citizen, male or female — should feel like a child before a leader — also known, and better known, as a servant. They are grown-ups, they are citizens, and such they should remain at all times outside the home and with whomever they are dealing.

That may or may not have been the message of the French Revolution, but that was certainly the message of the American Revolution.

That may or may not be the way it's supposed to be in the French Republic, but that is certainly the way it is supposed to be in the American Republic.